Comments

They don't really make a difference in the long haul, it really is something of an illusion, albeit a good one until a second run. Choose to save Shawn over Duck? Shawn dies anyway while Duck lives. Save Carley/Doug? The one you saved ends up getting shot by Lilly in Ep. 3 regardless. Choose not to go the Dairy? You get outvoted by the rest of the group and end up going anyway. Try to save Larry? He ends up getting salt-licked in any event. Cautious, alert Lees (i.e. those that check the garbage pile that's obviously hiding a Walker) end up getting the same fate as Lees which aren't as observant, etc.

I played the first time choosing what I would do/say (theoretically) in the situations that Lee found himself in. Then I went back and chose what I thought would be better in retrospect except that sometimes these choices weren't any better or even significantly different in results than my original ones.

However the person that I was and how others interacted with me did change depending on my choices. Just like in life you can't always choose some things but you can still choose the kind of person you are and how you treat others. Hmmm...

It changes the game by giving you the power and even if your actual actions and outcomes are the same as everyone else your experiences are different and you have the freedom to insult or punch someone even if it doesn't make a difference to the story

Even though I loved this game to death, the one complant I have is I was disappionted with choices. After I beat it, I thought some choices mattered. But then I thought about it. Nothing really mattered the whole time. If I choose to give Larry cpr, Kenny kills him anyway. If I save Ben, he falls off a building and dies anyway. If I try to calm Lily she shoots Carley If I dont think we should eat food out of this car, Everyone does it anyway etc. And With the car thing, I kinda thought it was dumb Lee had to face reprucisons over something he didn't do. I know that wasn't the only reason the guy kidnapped Clementine, but still. If we never did that he would have never gone psycho and talk to his wife's head. I don't think players should have to deal with that if they disagreed with taking food from the car. I really think telltale should change this in season 2.

It's just an illusion. At best, you delay deaths, you don't prevent them.

There are conversational choices, but the real choices mean nothing in the long run. It made me sad, despite how much I appreciated the rich characterizations, the atmosphere, the visuals, the acting, and the compelling moments in this game.

There's a lot to recommend the game, but true meaty choices with real consequences just aren't on the menu. Maybe in season 2.

That is true, and dont think I ignored that. Kenny ended up hating me most of the game cause I tried to save Larry, and I thought that was cool (not cool that he hated me, cool that the game actually reacted). But I just feel that I'd like to have a say in who lives and dies. Other than Carley or doug, there wasn't any.

It's just an illusion. At best, you delay deaths, you don't prevent them.

There are conversational choices, but the real choices mean nothing in the long run. It made me sad, despite how much I appreciated the rich characterizations, the atmosphere, the visuals, the acting, and the compelling moments in this game.

There's a lot to recommend the game, but true meaty choices with real consequences just aren't on the menu. Maybe in season 2.

i feel like kinda tricked. in my opinion making choices should change the storyline a lot, not just only how people think about you

I love the game done get me wrong but I agree with most people. It doesnt make much of a difference in the long run. My problem is this, Telltale sells the game soley on this, so what they need to do moving forward is make this MORE game changing, and make these BIG choices matter. Like you can decide who you go in your journey with, when you save people you get different lines, rather then the same outcome. We need more game changing, story changing decisions. I would like to play this game more then once, and have a complete different experience and outcomes. Not the same thing. Its a shame i dont get to play TWD again till new episodes come out. Love the game, BUT please, lets do better.

i feel like kinda tricked. in my opinion making choices should change the storyline a lot, not just only how people think about you

I agree completely.

As good as the game was, imagining how amazing it could've been if you could've actually saved people like Carley, Doug, Mark, Ben, and Kenny makes me really sad. I mean, I know you have to lose people, but if you could only choose which ones you lose, at least to some degree...

As good as the game was, imagining how amazing it could've been if you could've actually saved people like Carley, Doug, Mark, Ben, and Kenny makes me really sad. I mean, I know you have to lose people, but if you could only choose which ones you lose, at least to some degree...

some people thought i'm depressed when i talked to them. they saw something botheres me, and its this game that screwed my mind

I also would have preferred more choices that effected the story. It's nice that the characters react differently to you but It would have been nice if your actions saved lives and cost them. I don't mean like the pick Carley or Doug moment, more like if you choose to help Lilly through out the story she wouldn't try and kill anyone (maybe just Kenny) but if you always sided with and helped Kenny kill her father she would turn against you at some point and someone/some people would get killed.

It's just an illusion. At best, you delay deaths, you don't prevent them.

There are conversational choices, but the real choices mean nothing in the long run. It made me sad, despite how much I appreciated the rich characterizations, the atmosphere, the visuals, the acting, and the compelling moments in this game.

There's a lot to recommend the game, but true meaty choices with real consequences just aren't on the menu. Maybe in season 2.

Even an illusion of a choice can make the choice matter even if only to one's self

In a game that is primarily about story and the relationships amongst its characters, I would say that the choices do matter a hell of a lot. When you can play a game and actually feel the blunt of the relationships and how they alter as a result of the choices you made, it definitely adds to the experience of the game.

People on these forums have gotten into intense, intense, arguments over why certain characters are his or her friends, why they are assholes, or why they are good people. Those discussions and arguments would never exist, of at least would not be so heated, if the game never gave you an option to side with one character over the other. Having the choices actually translate into real emotion throughout the playthrough and really allow the player to reflect on just who these characters are is worthy of commendation.

So with this particular game being about the relationships amongst its characters, yes, choices do play a pretty big deal because it alters how we look at these character as we essentially become Lee; feeling the blunt of our actions and choices. The characters may all end up in the same boat regardless of the overall choices we made, but every tense argument and moment within the game would not have been so had we not had the chance to side with other characters.

Would Kenny's speech about Lee being his only family left have felt so emotional had the player never been given a choice of having his back? Would it have felt so good for others to tell him to go fuck himself had the game never gave a choice to help Lilly? Would Carley or Doug's death been so shocking and tragic had we never been given the choice to save one at the cost of the other and form a personable relationship with them based off our own perspective and choices? Our perspective and emotions towards these characters are fueled by the choices we were given, at least in my opinion.

Carely still dies, Doug still dies, Ben still dies; yes that is all true, but I think it matters much more on how our relationship was with those characters more so than how they ended up. Choices don't always have to alter someone's fate to be seen as essential; relationships are just as important, especially in the Walking Dead.

The choices matter a lot in subtle ways. That said, what a lot of people seem to mean by "the choices don't matter" is "the choices don't completely alter the entire course of everything in the game". And there's a reason for that: They don't want to make fifty different games.

Consider one of the early choices: Save Doug or Carley. If you save one, the other dies. That is a choice mattering. End of discussion.

They change the conversations, but in the end more or less we get the same results. If you choose Carley/Doug and try to blame yourself or something they still die. :-/

It could apply to real life in a Zombie Apocalypse.

Like the girl in Episode 3 surrounded by walkers and I'd want to save her but there's no way, she would be devoured than shooting her in the head. I just can't bring myself to shoot someone innocent in the head in such emotional games like these.

Although, if it were GTA, I wouldn't take it too seriously but it isn't.

Oh come now, Mass Effect 1-3 gave us primary colors. What more do you want?

This. So much this. Not to mention Bioware probably had triple the budget and time for their series. Honestly I feel choices matter just for the different relationships they create. Even if the choices didn't matter, I'm still happy with the illusion of choice which adds a awesome flavour to the game.

Besides I think quite a few people want right and wrong choices to make. They wanted to save Carely or Doug or Larry or Ben, or keep Lilly with them and I think that's a stupid thing to expect. Firstly because TT can't make wildly branching story lines. Secondly because for example if someone could save Carely in ep 3, everyone who didn't would just go back and do it and ep 3 would miss a very shocking and emotional moment and the ep wouldn't be as good as it is. People who failed to save her would feel like they were just getting a glorified game over and would simply go back and change it.

There are choices to be made in this game, and they do affect the narrative within a certain scope. At the end of the day, this game is a narrative whose overall story is set with different variations in between. So yes, there's going to be a significant amount of railroading to keep the story manageable within the scope the writers had set for this story. And don't get me wrong, TTG gave us an AMAZING narrative.

At the same time, I think a lot more choices could be included to derail the narrative so to speak. One way is to have more opportunities to compound previous choices. For example, let's look at everyone's memorable scene outside the RV. Instead of having Lee being essentially powerless despite past choices, TTG missed an opportunity to include the impact of past choices. If Lee sided with Lilly in the meat locker or in different arguments against Kenny for example, Lee could be given an opportunity to say "Lilly, I've always trusted you before and I want you to trust me this one time!" to calm the situation down thus saving the day. Others would lose a team member. From that point on, there could be multiple ways leading to a varied ending that could still be grounded on similar backgrounds (i.e. Clem kidnapping, boat hunt, etc.). Right now, what we have is a railway that makes brief divergents before converging back at certain points. I mean most choices really just mattered at specific junctures and aren't necessarily continuous.

It's not like there's no precedent for this type of storytelling. A great example is Dragon Age Origins, where the player has so many choices that affect a great cast of different characters with deep backstories...many of them can be saved, abandoned, changed in moral beliefs, outright slaughtered etc with significant impact on the final conclusion.

Like I said, it's not like what we have isn't great or didn't always mattered. However, I won't be opposed to more choices that CONTINUOUSLY compound on previous ones that lead to branching stories. I think it might add more opportunities for TTG.

They don't change the Story (much)
BUT they do change the experience, the way people treat you is different, the way
Clem acts and talks is (unfortunately only a little) affected like in the barn where she says:
shit..., right lee? or if you decided not to use such words wherever you could avoid them
she says: like manure, like when a horse plops. it's no big deal but it shows you she is affected by you. other characters are too, if you encourage ben he'll tell you (in ep4) that Clem is playing in the backyard. if you treat him like shit he'll lie to you, saying:
she's upstairs with molly. that's just little things but there were bigger ones like wheter Kenny likes you or not, and whether you like HIM or not, if you did both the scenes in the attic will be emotional to you, the thing with the little boy and also talking about your past at the dairy. if you choose to give larry a chance you might miss him in the end because you would like to know more about him, if you didn't you don't. there are more examples i could give but i think that should be enough to prove my point.